Wesołych Świąt!

Merry Christmas! Or more precisely, “merry holidays!” Veh-SO-wikh SCHWEE-ant. A tricky phrase, I think. Wesoły is pretty straightforwardly “merry” or “joyful” or “jolly,” all adjectives that comport with the overtones of English-spoken Christmas. The ending –ych indicates genitive plural. Świąt is the genitive plural of swięto: neuter nouns drop the ending –o, and in this particular instance, we sound shift the vowel from ę, the nasal “EWnh”, to ą, the nasal “AWnh”. I don’t know why, and in trying to divine the various resonances and possible derivations of the word, I find myself confused, though affably, by the word associations: świat (“world”), światło (“light”), świetny (“splendid”), and święty (holy). As if, etymologically, the greeting itself infuses the whole world with light, splendidness, and sacrament. Now, as for the grammar, because the idiom appears in the plural genitive form, wesołych świąt must be the expressed portion of a larger, partially implicit idea. In English, “Merry Christmas” means “have a merry Christmas” or we hope you have a merry Christmas”. But that can’t be the meaning in Polish, unless the implied verb requires the genitive case, instead of the more usual accusative. More likely, the preposition dla (“for”) governs the case, as in “best wishes for Merry Holidays.” Let’s go with that for now.

 

My visa has arrived this week, and my passage ticket, this morning. Merry Christmas to me.